Temple Run 2 Is a Clone of Itself

Over 170 million downloads later, Temple Run protagonist Guy Dangerous is back to steal some (graphically enhanced) golden idols.

Earlier this week, I wrote a story titled “Why Your App Won’t Be the Next Temple Run,” which argued that unestablished indie devs will find it difficult to replicate the success of Imangi Studio’s free-to-play endless running game, which has now been downloaded over 170 million times. Lo and behold, the actual next Temple Run was announced later that day.

The weird thing was, all of the clones were actually far better-looking than Temple Run, which was always somewhat visually bland. Now, in an effort to match the quality of games that have stolen ideas from it, Temple Run 2 runs the risk of looking like a knockoff of its own source material.

Temple Run 2 designer Keith Shepherd calls the clones “flattering, but frustrating,” but doesn’t think his game will be toppled by the competition.

“I think the innovators are the ones who come out on top,” he told Wired via phone.

Temple Run 2 is, more than anything, a graphical overhaul of the original game. Imangi Studios has added a few new mechanics like mine carts and zip lines, but the lush surroundings and rolling hills make it mostly an aesthetic upgrade.

The game looks good, but not markedly better than the clones. It merely brings Imangi’s franchise up to par with the imitators. There isn’t nearly as much diversity in the environments as you would expect, and there are even a few technical issues like lagging and texture pop-in. As a result, Temple Run 2 seems sort of like a response to the clones of its predecessor.

Shepherd says that the game has been designed with a framework that will be easy to expand upon. Temple Run 2 was built from the ground up on the Unity engine, which will allow Imangi to port it to other platforms far more easily (it took Imangi seven months to deliver the Android port of the first game).